Mira Begins to Overcome Her Hang-Up

The pain kept Hughes from answering her. Through half-closed eyes, he noticed that Mira was carrying him on her back. Though it could hardly be called that: he was so tall that most of both legs dragged along the ground.

His right arm passed over Mira's shoulder and hung across her chest, gripped by her normal arm. Her demonized arm, wrapped tightly in a cloak, held him around the waist.

Hughes looked silently at her reddened, bleeding arm. He knew his last Fire Fist had burned it.

"Put me down. I'll be fine once my head clears!"

"The mountains around here are all that group of Forest Vulcans' territory. They might have spotted us. We need to get out of here quickly!"

Hughes reached out with his other, free arm and patted her. "Don't worry. A Forest Vulcan is just a little ant to me. It was only so troublesome because I happened to have an attack and lost control."

"Let me rest a bit. Being carried like this is making my head feel worse!"

To avoid another sneak attack, the four found a wide-open place to rest, and Hughes lay down in the shade of a tree.

Under Mira's guidance, Elfman started a fire and cooked.

Lisanna racked her brains, trying to figure out how to restore Hughes's blue-and-white striped hospital gown, of which only a corner remained.

After Hughes's consecutive battles with Balrog the Flame Demon and the demonized Forest Vulcan, his hospital gown had finally made a glorious sacrifice.

Under the tree, Hughes lay bare-chested with his eyes closed, resting. The hot wind passed through the forest and became a gentle, warm breeze that felt quite comfortable against his skin.

The pain in his head eased slightly, but Hughes grew increasingly uneasy.

He knew his condition. When his emotions ran high, he would lose control for no reason. Once he did, he would become incredibly irritable, descend into madness, and want to destroy everything.

After he returned to normal, his head would throb with pain, as if someone were drilling holes in his brain with an electric drill.

His illness had already flared up twice in the two days since he had transmigrated. It had never been this frequent even when he was in the psychiatric hospital.

He still had the same body as before, so the problem might not lie with him. He didn't know whether this world or the Flame-Flame Fruit was responsible.

The first attack had happened when he faced Balrog the Flame Demon; he had lost control after using the Flame-Flame Fruit. This time was the same. He had been normal at first, but after using Fire Fist, he had lost control and nearly killed Mira.

If that really was the case, should he use the Flame-Flame Fruit less often? But wouldn't that be tying his own hands?

Hughes looked at the panel. There was still one thing on it he hadn't tried: Perfect-Level Tekkai...

At that thought, Hughes opened his eyes. He had almost forgotten something important.

He looked toward Mira in the distance. Hidden inside her cloak, she was still teaching Elfman to cook.

He still hadn't apologized to her...

Lisanna clutched the sole remaining corner of Hughes's blue-and-white striped hospital gown. Seeing him open his eyes, she spoke dejectedly.

"Brother Hughes, I mended Sister Mira's and Brother Elfman's clothes, but yours is too hard!"

She held up the scrap of fabric, which didn't look remotely like clothing, deeply regretting what she had just said.

She could mend clothes, but even a clever housewife couldn't cook without rice!

Hughes had no intention of being considerate of her, nor did he intend to let her give up.

He knew it had been this chatterbox of a girl who came up with the idea of hitting him with a rock.

"Are you going to give up just because it's hard? Just because you can't do it today doesn't mean you won't be able to tomorrow!

You can use the time you spend eating, traveling, sleeping, and resting to think about it. If you can't finish it, it's because you're not capable enough.

How are you going to make money in the future like that? 996 is a blessing of the past; now it's all about being on standby 007!"

Hughes had wanted to repeat a few more of the director's favorite sayings, but when he saw Mira walking over, he feared she would catch him bullying her sister. He gradually shut his mouth and stopped lecturing.

As for Lisanna, she ran off as soon as Hughes stopped talking, without the slightest sign of self-reflection...

Mira brought over a bowl of steaming-hot food and set it beside Hughes. "Are you feeling any better?" she asked softly. "Can you eat by yourself?"

Hughes nodded. "It's nothing serious. Let it cool first. I'll eat in a bit."

Steam rose from the food beside him, carrying wisps of fragrance.

Lying on the grass, Hughes turned his head to look. It was a bowl of porridge, with many things in it that he didn't recognize.

The original story had said that Mira was a good cook. Having seen her teach Elfman with his own eyes, Hughes thought the original story was right.

At the very least, the aroma now reaching his nose was much better than that of anything he had ever eaten.

Mira, who was still beside Hughes, recalled something she had happened to discover while searching for ingredients. "Hughes, a lot of the food in that bundle of yours isn't edible!"

"Oh, the food in that bundle was taken from your village... No, the people of your village gave it to me willingly.

You know what the people in your village are like. I'll use what I can and use the rest as fishing bait."

Hughes thought he would have a better chance of survival eating something pulled at random from the grass than eating food from those unruly villagers.

He had only asked them for the food to use it as bait, to lure fish or wild beasts.

He was quite curious about how the flying fish of the Fairy Tail world tasted, and whether they were really that awful!

He patted the grass beside him, motioning for Mira to sit down.

"Hey, Mira, what I said earlier wasn't what you thought it meant..."

Hughes didn't explain further. He couldn't explain it anyway.

He couldn't very well tell her that he was a transmigrator with a system, and that he had accepted a mission whose objective was to defeat her...

Although the kids in this world weren't as precocious as those in the eye-legend world next door, they still understood quite a lot. Hughes thought Mira should be able to understand.

Mira, sitting beside Hughes, paused slightly.

Her cloak hid her expression from Hughes, but judging by the way she sat hugging her knees and the fact that she was still there...

This should be behind us now... Hughes breathed a long sigh of relief inwardly.

"Hughes, are you a demon too?"

Mira's subdued voice rang out. The image of Hughes effortlessly controlling the flames kept lingering in her mind.

Hughes found the withdrawn girl's question somewhat difficult to answer. He couldn't tell whether the Flame-Flame Fruit counted as magic in the Fairy Tail world, since they belonged to two different systems.

Magic in the Fairy Tail world was based on magic power, while the Flame-Flame Fruit was based on physical strength, with its power tied to how much it had been developed.

But if the question was whether he was a demon, then he really did count as one. After all, he had awakened the Flame-Flame Fruit by absorbing Balrog the Flame Demon.

Besides, according to some accounts, a demon resided inside every Devil Fruit... Hughes didn't know whether that was true or not.

"Mira, I'm actually just like you. I also encountered a demon at your church, but I met mine in an underground stone chamber beneath it.

It was a demon made of flames, called Balrog the Flame Demon.

I ate it, and then I gained the power of fire."